Movie Breakdown: Beckett

Pre-Screening Stance:

Ferdinando Cito Filomarino worked with Luca Guadagnino on Call Me By Your Name and Suspiria, and Beckett is his English-language directorial debut. That’s an interesting enough tidbit to make me want to see the film. Well, that and the fact it stars John David Washington and Alicia Vikander.

Post-Screening Ramble:

Beckett is a quality old school thriller. Its setup is simple – after his girlfriend (Alicia Vikander) dies in a car accident, Beckett (John David Washington) is left to his own devices in Greece. While revisiting the scene of the crash, he steps squarely into a “wrong place, wrong time” trap and finds himself abruptly launched down a dangerous path. Naturally, while things get off to a pretty streamlined start, the rest of Beckett’s trials and tribulations uncover something fairly complex and wide-sweeping.

This is definitely a slow film, but not one that drags. Writer/director Ferdinando Cito Filomarino is happy to show how stunning areas of Greece are, to give you a moment to see its various types of people, and to give you a dash of insight into its political climate, but since all of this is framed around Beckett on the run (with the goal of getting to the US Embassy), the film doesn’t feel like it meanders. I do think it could have been a little shorter and an occasional laugh would have been nice, but overall its purposely plodding approach manages to be engrossing enough. On the performance front, John David Washington is compelling as a man so in over his head that all he can do is fumble forward, and Boyd Holbrook’s presence really heightens the third act.

If you’re into lush, patient thrillers, then you should give Beckett a shot when it hits Netflix this Friday, August 13.

One Last Thought:

I don’t guess I ever noticed it before, but John David Washington is particularly great at looking bewildered.